Win The Beijing Lottery And You Get Permission To Buy A Car…

Winning the lottery would be a life changing event for most of us, but the Beijing license lottery is not quite as life changing as you might hope.

The explosion in the city’s population has driven car numbers on the roads to gridlock proportions. So in an attempt to try and cut back the pollution and traffic jams, Beijing introduced a lottery to win license plates.

Now over 1 million Beijing residents eagerly await the monthly lottery to see if they have won the permission to own a car. With only 20,000 licenses released each month the odds are better than your average lottery but have left some residents waiting for nearly 2 years to buy a car.